I LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, i 



A UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, J 



ft 

i ■ \ 



SOUTHERN INDEPENDENCE : 
AN ADDRESS 



DELIVERED 

AT A PUBLIC MEETING, 

IN 

THE CITY HALL, GLASGOW, 

BY 

JAMES SPENCE, 



26th NOVEMBER, 1863. 




PUBLISHED BY 

. RICHARD BENTLEY, LONDON, 

(Publisher in Ordinary to Her Majesty.) 

MURRAY AND SON, GLASGOW. 



SOUTHERN INDEPENDENCE 
AN ADDRESS 

DELIVERED 

AT A PUBLIC MEETING, 

IN 

THE CITY HALL, GLASGOW, 

BY 

JAMES S PENCE, 

26th NOVEMBER, 1863. 




PUBLISHED BY 

EICHAED BENTLEY, LONDON, 

(Publisher in Ordinary to Her Majesty.) 

MUEEAY AND SON, GLASGOW. 

1 86 3. 



9 



3 7' 



PRINTED AT THE ALBION OFFICE, 5. UNION COURT, LIVERPOOI 



The Requisitionists, whose invitation led me to 
Glasgow, have requested me to revise the following address, 
for the purpose of publication. In doing so, I have collated 
the newspaper reports and added a few sentences requisite to 
render the argument more complete or clearer to readers 
unfamiliar with the subject I have added, too, some notes, 
which are given as an appendix, in order not to interrupt the 
reading of those who may not be critically disposed. I take 
this opportunity to tender my thanks to many whom, I trust, 
I may now call friends ; and to say that I think those who 
were present in considerable number, and strongly opposed in 
opinion, offered no opposition that was beyond the limit of 
dissent fairly to be expected at a public meeting. 



Liverpool, December 5, 1863, 



AT A 



PUBLIC MEETING, 

HELD IN THE 

CITY HALL, GLASGOW, 
On THURSDAY, the 26th of NOVEMBER, 1863, 
JAMES H ANN AN, Esq., IN THE CHAIR, 

Mr. Spence, on rising, was received with prolonged 
applause, intermingled with some hisses from the Northern 
party. When these had subsided he proceeded thus : — - 

I thank you, gentlemen, for your cordial reception, and 
I may say that I am rather pleased than otherwise to hear a 
few hisses. I am glad we have some of Northern sentiment 
amongst us, for I think a little opposition adds to the life and 
interest of a meeting, as a dash of acid gives a zest and finer 
flavour to fruit.— (Cheers.) And I recommend you, when you 
hear anyone hissing, just to let him hiss, for generally when 
you call for order you make more noise than that you wish to 
stop. — (Laughter.) This is a very large hall, and I rather fear 
my voice may not reach to its extreme end. If this prove so I 
shall be glad to be informed of it. I was told to-day in your 
good town, by a Scotch friend, that one difficulty you would 



6 



experience in hearing me to-night would arise from my English 
brogue. — -(Loud laughter.) Now, this is a difficulty I cannot 
overcome, and so you must bear with it as well as you can. 
(Cheers.) 

Gentlemen, I received the requisition alluded to by your 
Chairman with much pleasure. That requisition was signed by 
two hundred of your citizens, .and invited me to address you on 
the subject of Southern independence. I am here in response 
to it ; and I feel pleasure in addressing this great assembly, for 
I am glad to witness the interest you take in a subject in which, 
in my judgment, it is time that this country should form and 
pronounce a decided opinion. Though all but a stranger to 
your city, I am not unaware of its claim to speak with a voice 
of influence and authority on any great public question. You 
have in this community a rare, I think an unequalled, combi- 
nation of the elements of commercial, manufacturing, and 
mineral industry. But these elements would have remained 
latent and unknown ; the Clyde might still have borne but 
skiffs and waterfowl upon its breast \ that coal and iron ore 
would have lain unseen and imprisoned in the earth, but for 
the energy and skill which have converted your once shallow 
river into a great seaport, and made your city — as a seat of 
manufactures, an emporium of commerce, and a great centre 
of the iron trade — unrivalled by any known to me in this 
combination and variety of industrial success. — (Hear !) I feel, 
therefore, that any opinion you may express upon a subject on 
which you have means of information not common to the whole 
country, will carry weight in every other part of the kingdom. 
— (Loud cheers.) 

Before I enter on the subject I am hear to speak upon, 
I wish to clear the way by removing one or two misconceptions 
which exist, I am told, in some minds. I wish to see public 
opinion aroused on this great, I was going to say this vital. 



7 



question, and I wish to see that active public opinion influencing 
the policy of the Government. But let no one imagine that 
this desire has any political object. — (" Hear, hear," and some 
hisses.) You won't find it very easy to put me out of good 
humour. — (Cheers.) Gentlemen, so far from urging this move- 
ment in any feeling of hostility to the Government, I do not 
even complain of the line of inaction pursued up to a certain 
time. I think it would have been unworthy of the dignity and 
character of this country had we evinced any eagerness to 
derive advantage from the dissensions or afflictions of another 
people. We have not done so. But just as I think it would 
have been wrong to be eager or hasty, so I hold it unwise to be 
obstinate and inactive when the time has come to move. And 
so far from hostility to the Government, there are few, if any, 
who more warmly admire the illustrious and venerable statesman 
— like whom none here will live to see another — who is now at 
the head of the Government, and whose name, for more than 
half a century, has been associated with the progress and 
identified with the renown of our country. — (Applause.) 

The other subject to which I will allude at once is 
slavery. Gentlemen — (Ah, ah !) — our friend here is in a great 
hurry. Now, I am quite sure he will find that I am as earnest 
an opponent of slavery as himself. — (Loud cheers and hisses.) I 
suppose the gentlemen who are hissing are advocates of slavery 
— (laughter and cheers) — for don't you see that they object 
when a man declares himself an opponent of slavery — (laughter) 
and I believe I am twice as earnest an opponent of slavery as 
that gentleman. He objects to it for one reason — I have two 
reasons against it. He objects to it for its own sake — so do I ; 
but I have another reason, for I believe it to be injurious to the 
white people of the South. — (Loud cheers.) I think it proper to 
allude to this subject at once, because you will soon find that I 
am not going to speak on the subject of Southern independence 



8 



as one halting between two opinions. My convictions upon 
it are clear and strong, and you will find, when I enter into 
the details of the question, that one reason why I advocate 
Southern independence is because, in my judgment, there is no 
other issue of the war that affords so reasonable a hope and 
prospect of the extinction of that evil. — (Loud cheers and hisses.) 

And now to proceed with our subject. You all know 
that the United States were originally the thirteen colonies that 
revolted from this country. You are aware that the Northerners, 
who now regard rebellion as so unpardonable a crime, are 
themselves the sons of rebels. — (Cheers and some laughter.) 
Well, have it the other way, and consider that it was King 
George III. who was the rebel and that they were the loyalists. 
And perhaps I may say something that will hurt these gentlemen 
more, for 1 will tell you that they were not only rebels but 
slaveholders too ; for at the period of their revolt, with one 
exception, all the Northern States held slaves. (" Hear, hear !" 
— and " That's something new.") As colonies, each was as per- 
fectly distinct from and independent of the rest, as Canada 
is now of British Columbia. When they became indepen- 
dent, each naturally became an independent State or Power, 
and was acknowledged by this and other countries as such. 
For the purposes of the war, however, it was very neces- 
sary that they should act together, and a union was formed, 
for which an elaborate Constitution was provided, called 
" Articles of Confederation." In this instrument each State is 
distinctly declared to be free, sovereign, and independent ; and 
you have it thus on clear record that there is nothing in the 
nature of a Union, or in the fact itself, to prevent each State 
being a Sovereign Power. — (Cheers.) Some years after the close 
of the war it was found necessary to revise this first Constitution, 
and provide a more effectual administration. But the Constitution 
was declared to be perpetual, and it was forbidden to alter it 



9 



without the consent of all the States. Two of these — North 
Carolina and Rhode Island — refused their assent, and in 
consequence the other States broke the terms by which they 
were bound, and seceded from those which adhered to them. 
Hence the present Constitution and Union not only originated 
in rebellion, but, strange to say, are the offspring of secession. 

The second Constitution thus formed, and which now 
exists — exists as regards its letter, for its spirit had long been 
departed from — was a compact or treaty of the very closest 
alliance, entered into by those Sovereign States, each of its own 
free will. Its principle is to commit to a common agent those 
functions of government which could better be performed by 
one agent for the whole than by each State for itself. Apart 
from these, the States retained all other functions in their own 
hands. It may perhaps not be known to all who are present 
that each one of these States has its own separate constitution, 
its own distinct government, its own peculiar laws, its military 
force, and the power of life or death over its citizens. All that 
governs the life of man, his property and its inheritance, his 
education, his conduct or misconduct, his whole daily walk and 
conversation, these are under the laws of the State, and the 
Federal Government has no more power over them than that of 
France. Each State is therefore a sovereign community, 
governing itself except as regards those matters which, in 
common with the rest, it committed to the general agent. Now, 
in taking this existing Constitution, you come at once to the 
very remarkable fact that there is not a word in it to forbid 
any of the States retiring from it, as they had done from its 
predecessor. Do not suppose for a moment that the able men 
who framed it were likely to forget so important a point. They 
themselves had just seceded. It was a contingency immediately 
before them, and yet, as I have observed, there is not a single 
word to be found in the Constitution that forbids in any way 



10 



the retirement of any one of the States from the compact. The 
reason was this — and all these facts are on record — that if they 
forbad the retirement of a State it was necessary, as a matter 
of common sense, to provide some power that should prevent 
that retirement ; and when it was proposed in the Convention 
of Philadelphia, which framed this Constitution, that this power 
of coercion should be provided, it was absolutely and 
unanimously rejected as being utterly opposed to the principle 
of the compact, which was that of free-will. — (Cheers,) Hence 
you are brought to this fact, that the coercion which is now 
attempted, and, indeed, practised by the North against the 
Southern States, has not only no warrant in the Constitution, 
but is the wrongful exercise of a power which was deliberately 
excluded from it. — (Loud cheers and some dissent.) (i) 

Gentlemen, I think it will be obvious to all of you that 
when Sovereign States enter into a compact for certain denned 
purposes, if some of them break the terms of that compact, it 
must be competent to the others to retire from it. — (Hear, hear f) 
This is plain, I think, to the reason of any man. You cannot 
deny it, unless you deny the sovereignty of the State ; and you 
cannot deny the sovereignty of the State so long as you admit 
that the system is a Federal system. If those States, when 
the Union was formed, had all been fused into one, there 
would have been no right of secession, because each would 
have been but the province of a single power ; but the very 
term Federal proves that the Union was framed on the basis 
of their remaining in a condition of co-equal authority, and 
therefore, as I have said, when the compact entered into is 
broken by some, the others have the right of retiring from it. — 
(Cheers.) Xo man who has the pleasure of addressing an 
audience in Scotland — a country so famed for logical research 
— (cheers and ironical laughter) — you see we are going to make 
a pleasant evening of it — (laughter and renewed cheers) — must, 



11 



I say, feel an inclination within him to enter upon a logical 
inquiry into this right of secession. — (Hear, hear !) But the 
subject is one which would not be suited to an audience so 
large as this, or to time so limited as ours. Lest, however, 
you should suppose that my opinions are peculiar on this 
subject, I will tell you that a Northern writer who was an 
intimate friend of George Washington, who was an eminent 
legal authority and a profound admirer of the Union — William 
Rawle — says, in his work on the American Constitution, that 
the right of secession is inherent in the Federal system of 
America. (2) 

And, if any of you are inclined to dispute that the right 
of secession is inherent in the Federal system, I will show 
you where that right, possessed by the Southern States, can 
be traced even to higher authority. — (A Voice, "No, no.") 
Gentlemen, my friend here is dissatisfied that the right of 
secession should come from any other source than the Federal 
compact, but I must tell you that it can be traced to a 
still higher source, the Declaration of the Independence of the 
United States. — (Hear, hear !) That Declaration of Independ- 
ence is the fountain-head of all American political principle, and 
therein it is stated that, whenever a Government no longer 
attains certain ends, and amongst them the pursuit of happiness, 
it is " the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to 
institute a new Government." — (Cheers.) Now, to say that a 
people have a right to abolish a Government, and yet have no 
right to secede from it, is really as absurd as to say that if you 
differ with a man you have a right to destroy him, but no right 
to leave his company. — (Cheers and laughter.) And you will 
find in the very passage from which I have just read, that all 
just Governments are based on the consent of the governed. — 
(Hear, hear !) Now, here is another lofty principle ; but what 
do you find the practice of the present day resulting from it \ 



12 



Is it upon the consent of those eight millions of men in the South 
that it is now attempted to base that Government which fire and 
sword are employed to force upon them 1 Why here you find 
at once, not only a deviation from the principles laid down in 
the most solemn instrument which a people ever subscribed, but 
you find that the action is exactly the reverse of that profession. 
— (Cheers and some hisses.) I would offer a little bit of advice 
to these gentlemen on the opposition side of the house. They 
know that when this address is over, I am prepared to stand in 
the pillory and answer their questions. — (Loud cheers.) Now 7 , 
might they not be content with inflicting that amount of 
punishment which I expect to receive at their hands '] — 
(Laughter.) And, furthermore, if they perpetually blow off their 
steam in this hasty manner — (a laugh) — they may not have 
enough of it left when they want it. — (Great laughter.) 

It is asserted by the supporters of Northern action, that 
these declarations of that famous instrument v r ere intended to 
apply to the whole of a people, and not to a part of it. This is 
but a lame argument. The Colonists who made the Declaration 
were only part of a people ; and more, they were only part of 
the Colonists ; for some refused to join them, and are part of 
our empire to this day. And, on this point, let me read you the 
w r ords of an authority of some weight in these times, Mr. 
Abraham Lincoln. — (Great cheering and hisses.) On the 12th 
January, 1848, he thus spoke in Congress: "Any people, 
anywhere, being inclined, and having the pow r er, have a right to 
rise up and shake off the existing Government, and form a new 
one that suits them better. — (Cheers and laughter.) This is a 
most valuable, a most sacred right — a right which we hope and 
believe is to liberate the world. Nor is this right confined to 
cases in which the whole people of an existing Government may 
choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people that can, 
may revolutionise, and make their own of so much of the 



13 



territory as they inhabit." Now, I doubt whether there is a man 
to be found in this hall whose ingenuity would enable him to 
frame a form of words that would offer greater attractions to the 
spirit of rebellion — that could incite it with greater ardour, and 
in more directions, than the terms which I have just read to 
you. — (Cheers.) And I ask you if it is not lamentable, if it is 
not painful, to find men not only prepared utterly to repudiate 
the principles they have professed, but to use fire and sword in 
destroying that very right at the hands of another people, which 
they have themselves practised and inculcated. And Mr. 
Lincoln is not only an inciter of rebellion, but a Secessionist of 
the very deepest dye. — (" Hear, hear I" and hisses.) This you 
will be surprised to hear ; but you will very soon find it to be 
true, — (loud hisses,) — too true for the gentlemen who are 
hissing. — (Loud laughter.) The Constitution of the United 
States does not prohibit the secession of a State ; but it does 
prohibit the secession of part of a State from the rest of it. — 
(Hear, hear.) It says : " No new State shall be formed or 
erected within the jurisdiction of any other State." In the face 
of this, when Western Virginia seceded from the rest of that 
State, Mr. Lincoln approved of this secession, because it told in 
his favour, and gave his party a number of votes in Congress. 
As an excuse for this war, we heard of an oath to maintain the 
Constitution ; but the moment there was an advantage to gain 
by breaking the Constitution, we hear nothing more of that 
oath. Thus, any one who seeks it may find an authority for the 
very grossest form, either of rebellion or secession, in Mr. 
Abraham Lincoln. — (Cheers and hisses.) 

Nov/, gentlemen, if you take these facts and deal calmly 
with them, I think many of you will shrink from expressing your 
sympathy with principles worked out in practices such as these. 
— (Cheers.) The Southern States have right upon their side. 
They simply do what Northern slaveowners did before them, 



14 



and have taught them to admire ever since. But you may ask 
whether, admitting the right, there was sufficient ground to 
exercise it 1 The immediate causes of complaint were these :— 
Many of the Northern States passed Legislative Acts, called 
" Personal Liberty Bills," the object of which was to defeat and 
nullify an express clause of the Constitution. They, therefore, 
deliberately broke the Federal compact. I don't say at this 
moment whether in the principle involved in those laws they 
were right or wrong ; but I do say that this was a breach of the 
Federal compact, committed by those States. — (Cries of " What 
is the law V and " Name the law I") I beg to remind these 
gentlemen that any one has the privilege, when my address is 
ended, of putting any question he may think proper, through 
the chairman. — (Cheers.) There is an old proverb, that "you 
cannot both eat your loaf and have it and if you question me 
to death now I shall not live to be questioned at the right time. 
— (Laughter.) One of the objects of the Constitution, as stated 
in its preamble, was " to ensure domestic tranquillity." Now, for 
a long series of years several of the Northern States, or their 
people, had adopted a practice of reviling and vilifying the people 
of the South, and when this system at length bore fruit in an 
armed invasion of Virginia, accompanied by murder and an 
attempt at servile insurrection, they applauded these acts. 
Now, is that the way to maintain domestic tranquillity '? 
■ — (Cheers.) Finally, the Northern States elected a President of 
a purely sectional character. Some of you may say that it was 
because of the defeat of their candidate that the Southern States 
seceded. — (A Voice : " So it was.") That is a perfect delusion. 
There were four candidates, one of whom only, Breckenridge, 
was that of the South ; and if Douglas or Bell had been elected, 
the Southern candidate would have been defeated, but no 
secession would have ensued. The reason why the election of 
Mr. Lincoln aroused such feeling was the fact that it was a purely 



15 



sectional one. — (Hear !) No such event had occurred before. 
That election drew a line right across between the North and 
South ; it was no longer a contest of parties but of people. 
Hitherto the struggle had been political, that election made it 
geographical ; and owing to the enormous influx of emigration 
into the Northern States, and the preponderance it had given to 
that section, it became, thereupon, plain to the Southern people 
that they must either submit to a state of hopeless, everlasting 
minority, or exercise their right of withdrawing from the 
Federation. — (Cheers. ) 

But although these were the immediate and superficial 
causes of the explosion, others far deeper and more important 
had long been preparing it. The great cause of this convulsion, 
that which overrides all others, is the fact that the people of the 
North and South are two people, distinct and in many respects 
antagonistic. That is the root of the whole eviL — (A Voice, 
" No, no.") They sprang, indeed, originally from the same race, 
but they differ now widely even in blood ; whilst in all other 
attributes — in manners, feelings, tastes, interests, and pursuits, the 
people of Virginia and the people of Massachusetts are more 
opposed than any two races of Europe. This was so from their 
earliest existence, and gave an entirely different tone to their 
character and their action. Virginia, as a colony, was ever loyal 
to the Crown ; nay, when at home a King was carried to the 
scaffold Virginia never wavered in spirit from her faithful alle- 
giance to the throne. — (Cheers and murmurs.) Massachusetts 
and the other Northern States were from their birth turbulent, 
arrogant, and seditious. — (Hisses and cheers.) An intense and 
selfish fanaticism marked that people from the first, as it does this 
day. And whatever difference originally existed has been largely 
widened under the action of time. In the South, with the 
exception of Louisiana, in which there is a population of French 
origin, the people are of almost purely British descent. In the 



16 



North, owing to the enormous influx of Celts and Germans, the 
blood is now more than half foreign to our own. That the 
Southerners are a separate people is proved by the very fact that 
they desire a separate government. Take any people who are 
really one — take the French, and conceive, if you can, any force 
that would tear them asunder. There is no stronger political or 
natural power than the cohesion of a people who are really 
homogeneous. — (Applause.) If the mere fact of speaking the 
same language and having some blood in common, made them 
one people or prevented their being two, that argument would 
prove that the Canadians are part of the same nation. They 
speak the same tongue ; they spring from the same race ; they 
are more closely in contact than the Southerners, and yet the very 
name of a Yankee is repulsive to them. Hence you see that 
the possession of some attributes in common is no proof of 
national unity. This is not an attempt to divide one people into 
two, but to compel two people to be one. 

And, indeed, have you not had proof enough within 
your own knowledge that these are two people ] Contrast their 
conduct throughout the war. In the North, merriment and 
feasting, satins, diamonds, and shoddy wealth; in the South, 
fasting, and penury, and sorrow. — (Great cheering. ) In the North, 
the hiring, the bribing of mercenaries to sacrifice their lives • in 
the South, the foremost of the land giving their own. In the 
North, bluster, speeches, dispatches, the things called sermons 
from the men called ministers of religion ; in the South, calm, 
silent resolution. In the North, a spirit of cruel ferocity and a 
thirst for devastation ; in the South, a simple desire to defend 
their homes and be let alone. In the North, every principle of 
constitutional liberty trampled under foot — every cherished doc- 
trine repudiated ; in the South, those laws and principles the 
guide of action. In the North, such men as Butler and Pope, 
Turchin and M'Neil, Milroy and Hooker ; in the South, such 



17 



men as Ashby and Stuart, as Lee and Beauregard, as President 
Davis the statesman, and Stonewall Jackson the hero. — (Loud 
applause.) 

Hence, you see with your own eyes not only that these 
are two people, but that they are widely different and opposed. 
And all the declamation you have heard about preserving a 
nation's life and cutting a nation into two is a mere rhetorical 
artifice or delusion. As I have already said, this is not an 
attempt to cut one nation into two, but to force two nations to be 
one. It is this fact — that the Southerners are another people, 
and the natural desire which it creates to have an existence and 
a Government of their own — that is the chief cause of this con- 
vulsion. But there is another, in the conviction which has long 
pervaded the South, that the Union was worked to the profit of 
the North and their ow T n loss. All who are familiar with 
Southern literature know it to be full of bitterness on this topic ; 
and when you consider that the immediate cause of the revolt of 
those thirteen colonies from this country was a duty of 3d. per 
lb. on tea, you can readily imagine that the tariffs which have 
been imposed on the Southern people must have produced a 
considerable amount of feeling. — (At this stage an attempt was 
made in the west gallery to expel a gentleman who had been 
rather demonstrative, and loud cries issued from all parts of the 
hall to turn him out.) Oh, no, let him stop ; let him have the 
chance of being converted. — (Loud laughter.) 

Gentlemen, the advocates of the North will tell you in 
reply to this that the Southern States voted for many of those 
tariffs, and that the Northern States voted against them. But 
they forget to tell you that these were occasions when duties 
were reduced, and when the Southerners supported and the 
Northerners opposed the reduction of the duties. They will tell 
you, too, that if they had been earnest on this subject they 
would have carried the Western States, whose interests were 



18 



identical with their own. Do you think the Western States, in 
their present policy, have been directed by their own material 
interests. You see them blindly following the lead of the East, 
without so much as a thought or a voice of their own ; and when 
you are told that the South has been indifferent on this tariff 
question, those who tell you so assume that you are ignorant of 
American history, and prepared with open mouth to swallow 
anything that may be put into it. I say this because any one 
who has given the slightest consideration to the subject knows 
that the Union was on the very brink of being shattered on this 
point alone. You cannot forget the time when South Carolina 
nullified the Tariff Bill and armed to resist it, and I believe that 
if such a man as Mr. Lincoln had been in the presidential chair 
at that period, the Union would then have come to an end. — 
(Hisses and applause.) It so happened that a Southern states- 
man, Jackson, a man of firmness and judgment, was President, 
and he, while maintaining the law, removed the ground of com- 
plaint by the gradual reduction of those obnoxious duties, and so 
postponed for a time the disolution of the Union. 

Now, gentlemen, we won't keep these friends of ours 
any longer in impatience, but we will come to the question of 
slavery. — (Hear, hear!) You will perhaps be surprised that I do 
not term it one of the causes of the war. You have been 
told that it was the sole cause and I tell you, on the con- 
trary, that it was the strongest imaginable reason against 
secession. — (" No, no," hisses and applause.) No, you say, 
well perhaps the negative opinion so loudly expressed by 
the gentleman on my right, may deserve greater attention after 
he has heard my argument. — (Applause.) Now, in the first 
place, how could slavery be the cause of this movement when 
slavery was never attacked I I admit that on a superficial view 
you may think otherwise. Slavery has been mixed up with the 
movement, and Federal advocates have cunningly interwoven 



19 



the two. But the party which is now in power, and whose acces- 
sion to power precipitated this convulsion, published a declara- 
tion, or as it is called in America " a platform," the Chicago 
platform, and in that declaration of the President's party it is 
expressly stated that the maintenance inviolate of the exclusive 
right of each State over its own domestic institutions was 
essential to that balance of power on which the integrity of the 
Union depended. Therefore, gentlemen, you will see that the 
great political party now in power denounced the idea of dis- 
turbing it. Then, there is another great authority to support 
my assertion, for the Federal Congress in 1861 passed an Act, 
the first step in the process of amending the Constitution, the 
intent of which was to render slavery in the States irrevocable 
for ever, so far as the Federal power could affect it. We come 
to another great authority. Mr. Lincoln stated in his inaugural 
address that he had neither the right nor the inclination — that is 
his own word — to interfere with slavery in the States. So, then, 
you are told to believe that a people are fighting to defend what 
the enemy had not even an inclination to attack. 

Now, this is not the first convulsion that has occurred on 
the same soil — there was another in its character very similar to the 
present — in which the rebels were slave owners — mark you, North- 
ern rebels and slaveowners — and in which they hoisted the flag of 
independence precisely as you see now. Was slavery the cause 
then ] Why, we, the opponents, were the greatest slaveowners 
and slave-traders of the world — we who are now so intensely 
virtuous, so full of that cheap virtue that needs no self-sacrifice 
and requires no self-control. Slavery clearly was not the cause 
on that occasion. And there have been two occasions when steps 
were taken to break up the Union. The first was by the 
virtuous New England States, when they found the war of 18 14, 
ruinous to their interests. They called a convention at Hartford — 
a flag appeared with only five stars upon it ; and doubtless, had 



20 



the war continued, the Union would then have been broken up 
by those Northern States now so very eloquent about cutting a 
nation into two. Was slavery the cause of the movement then ] 
Or take the other occasion to which I have referred, when South 
Carolina nullified the Tariff Bill — Had slavery anything to do 
with that ? And I will ask you to pass for a moment from the 
past to the future. California, with Oregon and the other Pacific 
regions, are larger than all Western Europe. Is there any person 
in this assembly who doubts that when this great region comes 
to be peopled by ten or fifteen millions of men, they will decline 
to be ruled by a Government 2,500 miles distant— a Power that 
frequently must be affected, if not guided, by interests opposed 
to their own 1 Everyone knows that the day must come for a 
great and separate Power on the Pacific. But those are Free 
States, and when they separate from the other Free States will 
slavery be the cause ? 

Now, gentlemen, I have shown you that in both the wars 
and on all the other occasions when the Union was threatened 
with disruption slavery had no part whatever — (hisses and cheers) 
— but I am prepared to go much further than this. I say that if 
slavery had been the first object of Southern thought, they would 
have clung to the Union with the most desperate tenacity. Let 
us take a case. Suppose any one of you were a Southern slave- 
owner, with 300 negroes, and that their protection was the chief 
object of your thoughts.; and suppose a person had come to 
you and said, "We are going to secede from the Union, and 
you must join us and vote for secession. What would have been 
your reply 1 You would have said, " Do you take me to be 
mad i What ! abandon the Union, which is my shield against 
the world, my protection against revolt, the fostering mother of 
the institution on which my all depends ! And what will be the 
first fruit of your secession ? Northern armies will invade you, 
with a host of fanatics in their train; they will seize your negroes 



21 



as spoil, incite them to turbulence ; possibly even to rise upon 
you. " No," you would say, " go to some one without slaves or 
without sense ; but do not ask me to commit such an act of 
suicide." This is clearly the language any sensible man would 
have used, if slavery were his chief consideration. And, 
remember, Virginia and other border States seceded after war 
was practically declared by Mr. Lincoln, and when it was clear 
that the immediate consequence of the act would be to make 
their soil the battle-field, and bring down Northern armies into 
the midst of their negroes. To say that any State would have 
taken such a course in order to protect slavery, is really as 
absurd as to say that a man would set fire to his house in order 
to protect his furniture. — (Laughter and applause.) (3) 

But perhaps you will say that although slavery was not 
attacked in the States, its extension into the territories was 
opposed. You are told that if excluded from the territories, and 
confined within the States, slavery would die out. Now, the 
slave States are twenty times as large as England, and if slavery 
could not find room to live in that vast expanse, how did it live 
and flourish in our little islands in the West Indies ? Every 
one who is familiar with the United States knows perfectly well 
that the question of slaver}' in the territories, was a purely 
political question, and had nothing to do with its moral or social 
aspects. It was simply a struggle for votes in the Senate of the 
United States, a struggle whether the new State to be admitted 
should be on the side of the North or the South. Lest you 
should be dissatisfied by receiving this as mere assertion, I can 
give you one or two facts to prove it. There are territories into 
which the South has had power to take negroes for many years. 
If they had the desire to extend slavery, they would have taken 
their negroes into these territories — into the great territory, for 
instance, of New Mexico, which, after being open to the 
entrance of slaver} 7 for twelve years, was found to possess 



exactly a dozen slaves. Here you see at once the absurdity of 
the thing. I challenge any one to take the map of the United 
States, and show me one territory into which a Southerner would 
take his slaves if it were open to him to-morrow. What 
conceivable advantage could he have in taking his negroes 
into regions 1,000 or 1,500 miles from any sea-port. It is a 
mere absurdity, therefore, to say that the moral question of 
slavery was concerned in this struggle, which was simply and 
solely a political struggle for the balance of power. 

There is another subject to which I think it necessary 
to allude, for I hear it often, as a popular and parrot-like cry of 
the Northern advocates : " Why, is not slavery declared to be 
the corner-stone of the new Confederacy." Well, it is perfectly 
true that a Southern orator stated that the difference of race and 
the inferiority of one race to another was the corner-stone of 
the system. But did you ever before hear of such a thing as 
taking a metaphorical expression of an orator, and making 
eight millions of people responsible for it I Mr. Stephens made 
a most able speech against secession, and you might just as well 
assert that the people of the South are opposed to secession 
because he argued against it. Now, leaving metaphor for fact, 
every man knows, or ought to know, where to find the corner- 
stone of a Confederacy. There is but one thing to which that 
epithet will apply, and that is its Constitution. Now, in the 
Constitution of the Southern States, there is not a single 
principle in support of slavery that is not really embraced in the 
old one. Strange to say, the only new principle is opposed to 
slavery, and that is the absolute prohibition of the slave-trade. 
There is not one word to prevent any State freeing its slaves 
to-morrow, and remaining a member of the Confederacy as 
before. Not one word in it could prevent the whole from 
emancipating and becoming entirely a free Power, and, as a 
free Power, living happily under that Constitution of which you 



are told slavery is the corner-stone. — (Great applause.) What 
do you think of the capacity of men who take up the sound of 
a phrase, and have not penetration enough to discern the sense 
of it, or the limits of its application 1 — (Hear !) (4) 

Well, I have endeavoured to show you that slavery was 
not the cause of this war, and is not the object for which the 
South is fighting — that secession occurred, not in consequence, 
but in spite of slavery. Let us now turn to another question ; 
let us consider — what you are so frequently told — -whether the 
object of the North, in pursuing this deplorable war, be really 
to emancipate the negro. Now, gentlemen, it is perfectly true 
that there does exist in the North a small band of men possessed 
of remarkable talents and great pow T ers of speech, who have 
lashed themselves up, upon this question, into a condition of 
passionate enthusiasm, and who, to gratify that selfish passion, 
are not only hounding on this bloodshed, but are prepared to 
exterminate men of their own race, and to level every restraint 
of law or humanity. Such a sect there is, and they are sincere ; 
all fanatics are sincere ; but they are a mere handful of men 
amid the twenty-one millions of the North. I ask you when you 
judge of a nation, whether you take the minority or the 
majority, with whom resides political power ? If you take the 
majority, you will find that they regard the negro with aversion 
and pursue the war, some for the sake of Southern trade ; some 
because they fear that separation now would lead to further 
secession in the future; but infinitely the greater number because, 
unhappily, through the evil effects of the Union on the character 
of the American people, a boastful ambition which has no bounds 
has become the leading characteristic of the Federal mind, and 
their idea of greatness being the gross one of greatness in size, 
they shrink from any reduction of their dominion. — (Hear, hear !) 

Now, gentlemen, if the real object ol the North were to 
free the negro, why not do it where they have the power. — 
(Cheers.) Over the whole of what are called the free States, 
President Lincoln now wields despotic power. — (" No, no," and 
cheers.) Over the whole of those so-called free States no man 



24 



can act, or speak, or write, or think and utter his thoughts except 
at the risk that the minions of Mr. Lincoln may seize him in the 
dead of night, hurry him away to a dungeon, and keep him there 
during his pleasure. I know those who have been thus treated. 
He has, therefore, ample power, and is not very nice in the use 
of it, and if his object were to free the slaves, would he not 
proceed with those that are within his reach I — (Hisses and 
applause.) Gentlemen, you have all heard of Fort Warren, and 
I, knowing those who have been immured in that political 
dungeon, may be permitted to speak with some warmth on this 
subject. Why, if he wishes to free the negro, does he not free 
those within his reach. — (Hear, hear !) He has all the slaves 
in Delaware, in Maryland, in Missouri, and in Kentucky 
absolutely in his power, but does he free them ? — (Cheers.) 
But let me not do him the injustice to say he has practised 
any hypocrisy on this point. These are the pretensions of his 
supporters, it is they who invent this hypocritical pretext. Let 
us hear what he says himself. (5) 

On this subject, personally, he has been honest enough 
throughout the war, as I will show you by some of his declarations. 
I have already referred to his inaugural address, in which he 
stated that he had neither the right nor the inclination to 
interfere with slavery in the States. He held himself to be bound 
by the Chicago platform of his party, which reprobated any 
such attempt. Again, in his letter to Horace Greeley, he stated 
that he would free the negroes, or some of the negroes, or none 
of the negroes — (great laughter and applause,) — just as it would 
save the Union to free them, or some of them, or none of them. 
Can words go any further I Again, the other day, he wrote a 
letter to the Democratic Committee of Springfield, Illinois, in 
which he said, " You go on fighting with me to save the Union, 
and when we have reached that point, if I wish you to go on 
fighting for anything further, it will be an apt time to say then 
you will not fight to free negroes." Over and over again, in all 
forms of words, Mr. Lincoln has told you his object was to save 
the Union, and nothing else. But some of you perhaps may be 



25 



inclined to remind me of his proclamation. He told you himself 
that was not directed against slavery on moral or social grounds, 
but was purely a measure of war. " I issued it," he said, " to 
save the Union." And here let me say a word or two about 
this proclamation. I know its effect has been to delude many 
minds in this country. But I should like to tell you what Cassius 
Marcellus Clay said on this subject. Cassius Marcellus Clay — 
(laughter) — a few days after, indeed, I think the very night, 
that the proclamation was issued in Washington — was serenaded 
there, and made a speech on the subject. He, Cassius Mar- 
cellus Clay — (laughter) — did not stop to consider what effect 
this proclamation would have in freeing four millions of blacks 
in the South in whom there was scarcely a vestige of humanity 
left. These are his words and show how the negro stood in his 
estimation ; but he thought " no King, no aristocracy, no 
House of Commons, no Chamber of Deputies could stand for 
a moment" arrayed against this great principle." Its object, 
therefore, was not the negro, but to throw dust in the eyes of 
Europe. — (Applause.) 

And how could that proclamation by any possibility have 
benefitted the negro race, unless excited by it they had risen in 
servile insurrection. It was addressed to the whole of them, 
except those States or parts of States where it suited the con- 
venience of Mr. Lincoln that slavery should remain. It was 
addressed to thousands remote from the reach of any of 
the Federal forces to which they could fly for shelter ; and the 
only possible means by which these could avail themselves of the 
proclamation was by marching to them over the bodies of their 
masters. On such work as this I will read to you the words 
of an American, not of the present but of a by-gone day, one of 
the great men — Channing — (cheers) — one of the noblest names 
in American literature — (understand I mean the real Channing, 
not the present bearer of the name.) Channing was one of the 
most earnest opponents of slavery ■ but on such work as that 
of the present day he wrote thus : — " Were our national Union 
dissolved, we ought to reprobate as strongly as we do now the 



26 



slightest manifestations of a disposition to stir up a servile war. 
Still more, were the free and the slaveholding States not only 
separated, but engaged in the fiercest hostilities, the former 
would deserve the abhorrence of the world and the indignation 
of Heaven were they to resort to insurrection and massacre as 
means of victory. Better were it for us to bare our own breasts 
to the knife of the slave than to arm him with it against his 
master." — (Loud applause.) 

These are the words — the noble words of an American 
and a Unionist. Contrast their spirit with that of the present 
day. It is a good thing — it would be a great thing, to terminate 
slavery, but it is not permitted to us to hew out blessings with 
the axe of crime. Once adopt the principle that the end will 
justify the means, and you may light again the fires of Smithfield, 
or remount the racks of the inquisition. We are bidden to 
love one another, and in that scope of affection to embrace all 
the family of mankind. But what think you of the Federal love 
for the negro that accompanies hatred for the white man, and 
appeared the other day in companionship with the offer of a 
reward of 2 5 dollars for the scalp of any slaughtered Indian ! 
Where are those red men now ? Once they were lords of that 
soil, a noble though a savage race. What did Northern love do 
for them 1 Did they so treat the Indian that the negro may 
safely be committed to their tenderness 1 — (Hear, hear ! and 
murmers.) He is gone — the last poor dregs of his race, hunted 
out and slaughtered down, are crawling away out of memory. 
He is gone ! His mounds are there ; his graves are there ; the 
names he gave to the stream and mountain cling to them still ; 
but he is gone — men, women, children, all are gone, decimated, 
extirpated, improved, off the face of the soil ! — (Loud cheers, 
again and again repeated.) 

And now there comes a question of another race. The 
negroes and coloured men sent a deputation to Mr. Lincoln 
some months ago. He told them to their faces that they were 
an inferior race — (cheers) — that the country was required for the 
white men, and as they could not live together the black must go. 



27 



— (Cheers, and cries of " Oh, oh.") He proposed to begin at 
once to ship them off to Central America, or any other spare 
ground, where they might be shot down like rubbish. — (Hear, 
hear!) This is now the prevailing sentiment in the North. The 
negro is the cause, they say, of all this mischief, and must be 
got rid of. So when the day of triumph and power shall come, 
the negro is to be improved away after the Indian. But this is not 
all. There is a third race. You had lately here a meek apostle 
of Federal Christianity. — (Groans and cheers, which continued 
several minutes. ) You will all recollect that rev. gentleman was 
asked why they did not let the South go; he replied : — "Let them 
go ; why, we want them to go — let them go as soon as they please, 
but they must leave the territory ; that belongs to us." Here is 
a pretty sequence for you. The red man is gone ; on him your 
philanthropist has done his work. The black man is doomed. 
Mr. Lincoln bids him depart. A third race is to follow. — (Hear, 
hear !) The people of Virginia — that was a great State before 
most of those in the North were thought of — kinsmen of our 
own — fellow-citizens of George Washington, the patriot, and 
Stonewall Jackson, the hero — (cheers) — the grand old dominion 
— the mother of Presidents — the ancient abode of loyalty and 
hospitality — the parent of what has been bravest and purest 
and best in American history — her men and women and children 
are to follow the race that is gone and the race that is 
doomed, that Northern speculators may sell her soil for building 
lots, or come and fatten on its fertility. — (Applause.) 

And now let us quietly consider this great, grave subject 
of slavery, not in the heat of excitement, but as calm, thoughtful 
men. It is there, a great, terrible fact ; four millions ot negroes, 
a population greater than that of the Union at the date of Inde- 
pendence. Who is to blame for it 1 Not the people of the 
South. They never invented slavery, they took no part in the 
slave trade ; on several occasions they protested against it. It 
was we, the people of Great Britain, who took these negroes 
from Africa, and planted that slavery there. — (Hear, hear !) The 
wrong is our wrong, and if there be any sin it lies at our own 



28 



door. — (Cheers.) They simply inherit the legacy we bequeathed. 
And is it not painful to every just or generous mind to hear men 
in this country abusing and villifying the people of the South for 
that which was our own act ? Suppose some man had knocked 
out by accident the eye of a youth, and you found the fellow 
abusing the sufferer for his blindness, would you not feel contempt 
and indignation at conduct so unjust and so base ? In what does 
the conduct differ of those who, well knowing that we created 
the evil, turn round to denounce the sufferer 1 Instead of this, 
is it not our duty to speak in tones, not of recrimination but of 
humility — to endeavour to atone for our own evil conduct — to 
make amends for our own guilt, and to offer the hand of aid 
and sympathy to those whom we placed in this position. — 
(Loud cheers.) (6) 

And what is it you now hope for, you who are advocates 
of the North ] What is the summit of your wishes ? Is it your 
object to arrive at the emancipation of the negro by some act 
that shall destroy and level the whole fabric of society at a 
blow 1 Why, gentlemen, consider the condition of these 
negroes — for our object in desiring their emancipation is to 
ameliorate that condition. You desire his emancipation, to 
benefit and bless the negro. I tell you that the great majority of 
the negroes — those on the plantations — have never had a 
thought for their living ; they are provided with everything, and 
have no more idea how to work their way in the world than so 
many children. — (Hisses and cheers.) Now, I will read to you 
a few words from a countryman of your own, a Scotchman, Mr. 
Stirling, who wrote letters from the slave States, in which he 
strongly opposed slavery. He observes : — " Any sudden and 
wholesale manumission would be at once dangerous to the 
master and disastrous to the slave. The deliverance of the 
South must be a growth — a gradual progress towards enlightened 
and efficient industry. No philanthropic juggle, or legislative 
sleight of hand, can transform a horde of helots into a nation of 
noble workers." Now, gentlemen, here is the experience of one 
who studied the country, and who tells you what would be the 



29 



effect of the rash measure which some of these advocates would 
have you to desire. 

The problem how to effect such a change in the condi- 
tion of so vast a multitude, without anarchy or industrial 
paralysis, is the largest and most difficult ever presented to the 
mind of the statesman. Nevertheless, when I reflect on the 
wonders the people of the South have accomplished — when I 
consider how they have raised and equipped great armies — how 
they have created manufactures apparently out of nothing — what 
self-devotion they have displayed — what calmness in the Senate 
and heroism in the field — I am convinced there is hardly a 
task that, in reason, could be proposed to them which they are 
not able to accomplish. — (Cheers.) 

But what ended slavery amongst ourselves ? It was 
not the result of an invasion. Do you think that if the people 
of France had invaded us to force emancipation upon us, we 
should have assented % Nay, you know better : in that case we 
should probably have been slave owners to this day. — (Cheers.) 
That which ended it with us was a calm conviction of duty. 
Carry this conviction to the Southern mind and you will gather 
from it the same fruit. — (Cheers.) I ask you, have you ever 
heard of a country or a people more ready, more willing, to 
make sacrifices ? You have seen them give their property to 
the torch — you know those women of the South have arisen 
from the grave of one child to equip another for the war. They 
have given all that was precious, all that was beloved, upon 
their country's altar. Think you they will shrink from another 
sacrifice when they feel it to be required.— (Cheers.) No ; they 
will make it, not at the instigation of abuse or the dictation of 
a foe, but as we did when, under God's blessing, the light burst 
in upon us \ and the scales fell from our eyes ; and we rose to 
a nobler view of man's duty to man; and we went out and 
made the sacrifice. — (Loud cheers.) 

Well, gentlemen, I am afraid I am going to trespass too 
long upon your time — (cheers, and cries " Go on") — and 
therefore I must hasten to consider the question of Southern 



30 



independence. You cannot give your minds to the consideration 
of this question without, at the same time, reflecting upon the 
consequences of a failure on the part of the South to achieve 
that independance, or in other words, of Northern success. 
Now, the first result of Northern success would be a 
war with this country, and there are circumstances I can con- 
ceive under which the people of the South, filled with resentment, 
and charging us with their ruin, might for a time not only be 
brought to sympathise, but to join with the people of the North 
in these hostilities. — (Cheers and hisses.) Gentlemen, all of 
you, no doubt, remember that we are here to consider this great 
political question, and I presume that here, as citizens, we 
cannot omit some thoughts of our own country. Now, it must 
be familiar to all of you, that scarcely a speaker in the North 
has alluded to the Trent affair without stating that the day shall 
come to avenge it • or to the prizes of the Alabama without 
asserting that we shall be made to pay for them. Mr. Chase, 
when, the other day, he expressed a w T ish to shake this country 
by the hair — (loud laughter) — told you that he thought when the 
bill should be presented you would think it best to pay it. I do 
not expect this course of events. I have faith in the victory of 
the South. But you cannot weigh the future without considering 
the possible issue of Northern success — an issue in which the 
Federals would jeer their well-meaning friends, and we should 
be, as politicians, the laughing-stock of the rest of the world. 

And there is another crime w r e have committed ; we 
have not sympathised with them. Undoubtedly there is 
an important section of this community who, unhappily, as 
I think, have been completely deluded by the hypocritical 
professions of the North. — (Cheers and hisses.) But I tell you 
that number does not include a single one of those great names 
which have been associated for half a century with our own 
glorious history of slavery suppression. No ; they are men of 
more discernment— (cheers) — men like Lord Brougham. — (Loud 
cheers.) Those birds are too old to be caught with chaff. 
- -(Laughter and cheers.) And, gentlemen, a war with this 



31 



country would be an absolute political necessity for the North. It 
would give them an opportunity of withdrawing the mind of the 
people from the history of the dismal past. — (Cheers and hisses.) 
When the reaction from the present excitement comes, it will 
be terrible indeed. — (Hear, hear!) The amount of debt, the 
bankruptcy, the amount of recrimination, the impeachments, 
the anarchy — such evils men will struggle to stave off by the 
excitement of a new war. The war party, too, must replace 
the old war with a new one or perish. — (Cheers.) And, there- 
fore, I tell you that those who are urgent now for Northern 
success, if they could only succeed, are labouring to bring about 
a war between that country and our own. 

Further, you must consider what are the consequences 
of the prolonged continuance of this deplorable war ! When 
you come to reflect upon them you will find them formidable 
indeed. We are placing the greatest branch of our commerce — ■ 
the cotton trade — on a purely fictitious basis, We see one 
effect of this to-day in the derangement of finance, to which it 
has largely contributed. We are stimulating our people in 
India and other countries to divert their industry to cotton, on 
the basis of an artificial price, and at the risk of ruin on the 
terrible reaction of peace. You w T ould consider it exceedingly 
dangerous to be building a costly structure on the foundation of 
a quicksand, and such is the process we are performing now. 
I regret to see a disposition to get rid of our operatives in many 
parts of this country, the bone and sinew of the land, in order 
to suit the convenience of the moment. I deplore such a 
policy ) if you disperse them, you are dispersing the strength of 
the country, and the elements of our future wealth. Again, we 
are compelling the Southern people, under pressure of the 
blockade, to become a manufacturing people. This will 
assuredly engender a spirit of protection, and ruin the most 
brilliant prospect ever opened to our commerce. That is an 
evil consequence which will result from a continuance of this 
war. But, in addition, I see an evil more formidable still. You 
are filling the breasts of the Southern people with resentment. 



32 



They regard us, and naturally, as the barrier to recognition by- 
other and willing Powers. Half of that Continent is filled 
with ineradicable enmity or jealousy — is it wise statesmanship 
to spread this sentiment over the whole ] 

And let us consider the consequences of a prolongation 
of this struggle to the well-being of the people of America 
themselves. Can you conceive any disaster, either to the North 
or the South, whether moral in the one direction or material in 
the other, to compare with them. The Americans the other 
day were a commercial people, they are now becoming a 
military people. You know what the effect has been in Mexico 
of a taste for drums and a horde of generals. There is an evil 
even beyond this. The natural tendency of great republics is 
to end in military despotism. Even by this day, within three 
years, the North would have sunk to this had a man arisen of 
sufficient capacity to play the despot. — (Cheers.) Let the war 
go on, and the man will appear. Already the noble rights of 
free speech and a free press are treated with contempt. Already 
that glorious bulwark of freedom, the writ of Habeas Corpus, 
is not only swept away, but there are even those who have 
jeered at it. What is the use of men dreaming dreams when 
we have such facts before us ] And in the South can any one 
doubt the evils there 1 can any one picture the suffering there, 
cheerfully borne though it be i Great districts that were a 
scene of prospering industry are given back to desolation. You 
have heard of a region as large as all Lancashire drowned by a 
single act of ruthless barbarity. In some quarters the poor 
negroes, driven from their homes, are huddled together, and 
perishing of want and disease. I say this not from Southern 
but Northern accounts. And the best blood of the land is 
going down into the grave. If this war should continue for a 
few years more, you may have the greater part of the country 
thrown back into silent desolation — desolation but not silent ; 
no, the widowed and the orphans will remain. — (Hear, hear !) 

And now, gentlemen, can any of you reflect upon the 
consequences of a protraction of this war, either on the one hand 



33 



to the people of America, or on the other to the people of this 
country, without being anxious that some effort should be made 
to terminate so disastrous a strife. Neutrality does not 
necessitate inaction. You will remind me that the policy of 
this country is one of non-intervention ! that you will not 
intervene, that you will not go between the two parties, that you 
will not take a part yourself. No one has urged or advised 
any such course, no one has counselled this. It is well 
known that there are European Powers anxious to move on 
this subject, who have been restrained by the inaction of 
this country. At first it was proper for us to see whether 
the Government which the people of the South had appointed 
would be able to maintain the position it had taken up. 
So long as a doubt existed it was a fair objection to 
recognition that although de facto a Government existed yet, 
in the course of hostilities the fact might be extinguished. But 
when at the end of three years — years which have witnessed 
so indomitable a spirit, so ardent a patriotism, so united a 
people — I say that at the end of three years of trial, the day 
has come for us to consider what should be done for these 
kinsmen of ours, exposed to this invasion of fire and sword. 
— (Loud cheers.) 

Gentlemen, you are told that you have no right to 
consider the independence of the South attained, because a 
certain point of its territory is occupied by the North. This 
argument is a mere confusion of ideas, a confusion of the 
attributes of independence with the incidents of war. In any 
war between two Powers one must invade the other — they 
cannot fight in the air. And the one that invades the other 
must occupy more or less of its territory. If, then, this 
occupation were a denial of independence, some power would 
cease to exist in every war that occurs. Independence is not 
contingent on such circumstances. It is the reverse of 
dependence — it implies that a country is not dependent on any 
other for its laws, its Government, its defence. On whom does 
the South depend \ And how is this war to cease, until Europe 



bids it cease I Wars do not cease from material but moral 
exhaustion — from the conviction that the object sought is 
unattainable. What can be conceived so certain to produce 
that conviction on the Northern mind as recognition of the South 
by Europe. That is a verdict never yet reversed. And in 
refusing this we incur a terrible responsibility for ail the future 
blood that is shed. Yet I do not urge recognition. All that I 
do urge is 3 that our Government should enter into relations 
with the other Powers of Western Europe, and that they, in their 
united wisdom, decide as to the measures most likely to influence 
a restoration of the blessings of peace. f 

Our inaction is indeed convenient at the moment ; it 
saves responsibility, and excuses irresolution. But this country 
did not attain its place amongst nations by a policy of inaction. 
It was not by doing nothing that we made ourselves what we 
are. And our eminence will hardly be maintained if we are 
always to leave it to another power to regulate the destinies of 
the world. Upon an American question it is the duty of this 
country not to follow, but to lead. It is our duty as men to 
hold out a hand when the voice of outraged humanity implores 
it ; it is our duty as politicians to consider the balance of 
power in the Xew World as well as the old ; it is our duty as 
citizens to give some regard to the interests of this country, and 
the danger threatening it in the future ; it is a duty we owe to 
our traditions to respect the desire for self-government expressed 
by a powerful people ; and it is a duty which this country — the 
parent of America — owes to her descendants, to make an effort 
to assuage the tempest by which they are torn, and restore to 
them the blessings of peace, on the only basis on which it can 
ever endure — and that is, the independence of the South. — 
(Loud and prolonged cheers.) 

After a number of questions had been put to and 
answered by Mr. SPEXCE,it was moved by Mr. William McAdam 
and seconded by Air. G. W. Clark : " That in the opinion of 
this meeting, the war in America is an injury to the world, and 
that the present aspect of the contest affords no_ hope of its 



35 

early termination, unless by means of the moral action of Europe. 
We, therefore, earnestly hope that the Government of this 
country will enter into communication with the other European 
Powers, to concert with them the best means of bringing about 
peace ; and that a memorial be presented to Government 
expressing these sentiments." 

This resolution was carried by a large majority, and the 
meeting terminated. 



37 



APPENDIX. 



(i.) Professor Goldwin Smith has discovered an easy reply to the 
right of secession. He observes "the short and conclusive answer, as it 
seems to me, to all arguments of the kind is this — that the States have all 
along treated with other nations as a single nation." But surely what they 
choose to do through a common agent in dealing with other Powers is no 
bar to their mutual rights as between themselves. Five men enter into 
partnership, and trade in the name of one of them, with whom only the 
world deals ; but every one knows that each of the five will have his 
perfect rights as a partner against the rest. When North Carolina and 
Rhode Island were for fully two years outside of the Union, the world took 
no note of the fact. But where was the "single nation" during that 
period ? A difficulty is raised, too, by the same authority in these words, 
" And suppose we recognise the Confederate States, we must recognise 
them severally by name." This is precisely what we did in 1783. We 
did not then recognise a Union, but we recognised each State severally by 
name, and admitted them to be free, sovereign, and independent States. 
Is there any difficulty in doing again what we did before ? 

(2. ) Within the limits of an address only a cursory view can be 
taken of each topic, otherwise abundance of authority for the right of 
secession can be found in the writings of Madison, Jefferson, Calhoun, De 
Toqueville, and others. The latter observes, " If one of the States choose 
to withdraw from the compact, it will be difficult to disprove its rights of 
doing so ; and the Federal Government would have no means of main- 
taining its claims directly, either by force or right. " As Rawle observes, 
the right, though not expressed, was "mutually understood." It was 
claimed in the very first Congress after the Constitution came into action, 
not by the Southern, but by the New England States, which throughout 
the history of the Union have asserted it whenever it suited their purpose 
to do so. But after all, what secession so gross and so flagrant as that 
practised by Mr. Lincoln and the Federal Government in the case of 
Western Virginia. Such are Federal principles. 

(3.) It is contended that the ordinances of secession prove that 
slavery was the cause of the war. This is not so, They allege as a 



38 



prominent cause of their movement an infraction and contempt of their 
rights. In the present instance this infraction bore upon slavery, as in the 
former case it bore upon taxation, but the ground of complaint is the 
breach of right, not its incidence. When Hampden refused payment of 
shipmoney it was not the tax that concerned him, but the mode of 
levying it. Men defend their rights as rights, and not for the sake of the 
subject of dispute, which is ofttimes trivial. Further, the great majority 
of the Southerners are not slaveowners at all. By the census of 1850, the 
last of which I have an analysis, there were only 37,662 owners of more 
than 20 slaves each, and altogether but 347,525 slaveowners in a white 
population of seven millions. Any alteration since will be in a direction 
in favour of the argument. It follows that in the whole of the Southern 
States but one man in four is a slaveowner. But in this movement we see 
perfect unanimity, and where four men fight we must seek for causes that 
affect the four, and not for a cause that is matter of indifference to three of 
them. The truth is, slavery was the party cry of the moment, and like 
electioneering cries for the time it drowned all others. So does thunder ; 
yet every one knows it is not the noise that strikes the blow, but that 
which makes no noise whatever. Had slavery been abolished years ago, 
the day would have come for the Southern people to separate from those 
whom they detest. 

(4.) It has been observed in reply to this that, whilst the old 
constitution contains no clause that prohibits Congress from abolishing 
slavery, the Confederate Constitution does prohibit the passing of any law 
" denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves." In this 
there is no real difference. The prohibition exists with equal force under 
both constitutions. Neither Congress has a particle of right to interfere 
with the subject. It is not a Federal but a domestic question, one 
solely at the disposition of the individual state. And here I would 
observe that the prohibition in the Southern Constitution does not extend 
to the legislatures of the states. In the face of it, any Southern state may 
free its slaves at any moment, or the whole may do so simultaneously by 
acts of their State Legislatures. To do this would not require one word 
to be altered in the constitution. 

(5.) The allies of the North excuse the fact that no attempt 
is made to free the negroes within reach, on the pretext that the Consti- 
tution stops the way. But it did not stop the way when a few votes could 
be gained by the secession of Western Virginia. It did not stop the way 
when the members of the Legislature of Maryland were seized in the night, 
and hurried off to a dungeon. It did not stop the way when the writ of 
Habeas Corpus was taken away from the whole of the loyal North. 
According to these principles, the Constitution may be violated to imprison 



39 



men, but not to free them. Such is the logic of abolitionists. When the 
Constitution is in his way Mr. Lincoln laughs at it ; when it suits his pur- 
pose to respect it, why he respects it. The Northern and Southern 
sections at this moment are both " slave powers." 

(6.) I commend this to the consideration of those who seem dis- 
posed to import into this country the slang and Billingsgate of American 
abolitionists. If the cause of emancipation be a pure and noble one, we 
should support it in a pure and noble spirit, and not soil and degrade it by 
exaggeration, untruth, and rant. Of all living men, he who has done most 
for the negro is the now venerable Lord Brougham. Of him a Federal 
advocate recently asserted, that he ' i stood up like a bully and lied." Is it 
by men who utter such language as this that a great cause can be 
advanced. And where was all this furious virtue but four years ago, when 
the great slaveowning power of the world was "the model Republic." 
And how comes it that all this zeal is directed against one part of the 
slaveowning world, leaving all the rest in tranquillity ? There is some- 
thing suspicious in the virtue that picks and chooses guilt ; there is some- 
thing more than suspicious in that which curses the Confederate slave- 
owner, but excuses and dallies with the slaveowning Federalist. 



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